The Maintenance Manager of the Year 2008

Tuesday, 9th of December 2008 – Surfhouse Evere, Brussels

1. Presentation: "Motivating our maintenance craftsmen"

by Mike Levery, author of several articles and guru on motivating maintenance craftsmen.

Do we really understand what makes maintenance craftsmen tick? After spending over thirty years working with maintenance craftsmen in a variety of industries and market sectors, I have come to the conclusion that the answer is “No, not really”. Chief Executives often say to me that maintenance is a headache: a problem better managed by somebody else preferably through outsourcing. They describe craftsmen as “a law unto themselves” and “out of control”. Nothing seems to have changed much in my 30 years of working in the field of maintenance. So is it the case that craftsmen and maintenance are “out of control”? Or is it that we just don’t understand what motivates craftsmen or what drives them to do an exceptional job?